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THE  STORY  OF 
THE  ALPHABET 


STORY  OF 

the 

ALPHABET 


BY  OTTO  V.'E'C'B  - - 

The  Cleveland  School  oj  Art 


''''Many  thanks  to  old  Cadmus, 

Who  made  us  his  debtors 
By  inventing,  one  day,  those 

CAPITAL   LETTERS." 

— Saxe 


PUBLISHED  BY 

NORMAN  T.  A.  MUNDER  &  CO. 
Printers 

BALTIMORE,  MARYLAND 


'<    /  c   '  •  I    ,'      pDpyright  1921  by 
V      ',   I  •'  ]NT6rm'an  T.  A.  Munder  &  Co. 


THE  STORY  OF    4, 
THE  ALPHABET  5> 

ITS   EVOLUTION  AND   DEVELOPMENT 

C/~\o  you  know  your  A  E  C's?  Each  Letter 
J_J  Character  Has  a  History  and  a  Reason 
for  Its  Present  Form.  Have  you  Ever  Questioned 
the  Origin  and  Significance  of  the  Alphabet? 

UR  transition  from  bar- 
barism to  civilization  can 
be  attribute^  to  the  al- 
phabet. Those  great  pre- 
histprjc  djsco verges  qnd 
inventions  such  as  the 
making  of  a  fire,  the  use 
of  tools,  the  wheel  and  the  axle,  and  even  our 
modern  marvelous  applications  of  steam  and 
electricity  pale  into  insignificance  when  com- 
pared with  the  power  of  the  alphabet.  Simple 
as  it  now  appears  after  the  accustomed  use  of 
ages,  it  can  be  accounted  not  only  the  most 
difficult,  but  also  the  most  fruitful  of  all  the 
achievements  of  the  human  intellect. 

Man  lived  by  "bread  alone"  and  without 
the  alphabet  untold  ages,  and  with  a  practical 
alphabetic  system  not  more  than  3,000  years. 
So  important  and  wonderful  was  this  step 
deemed  by  those  who  lived  nearer  the  time  of 
its  inception — in  the  time  before  the  wonder 
of  its  extraordinary  powers  had  been  blunted 
by  long  possession  and  common  use — that  its 
invention,  as  well  as  that  of  writing,  was  in- 
variably attributed  to  divine  origin. 

Modern  investigation  always  seeks  sources 
other  than  mythological  ones,  and  thus  the 
science  of  ancient  handwriting,  paleography, 
came  into  existence.  In  the  last  hundred  and 


B194 


THE   STORY  OF  THE    ALPHABET 

twenty-five  years  the  writing  of  the  ancient 
Egyptians,  which  was  a  "sealed  book"  for 
nearly  twenty  centuries,  has  been  deciphered 
through  the  efforts  of  Champollion  and  Young ; 
the  mysterious  cuneiform  characters  of  an- 
cient Assyria  and  Babylon  have  been  inter- 
preted by  Grotofend  and  Rawlinson,  and  the 
"missing  link"  to  connect  our  present  alpha- 
betic system  to  these  ancient  ones  is  being 
partly  completed  by  Sir  Arthur  Evans,  who  is 
compiling  and  analyzing  Cretan  characters 
and  pre-Phoenician  writing.  The  story,  how- 
neyer,  will  rdbiWy  never  be  told  in  its  en- 


THE  forms  of  our  letters,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  G,  J,  U,  W,  reached  their  full 
development  two  thousand  years  ago.  The 
Roman  letter  was  the  parent  of  all  the  styles 
notwithstanding  the  diversity  that  has  ap- 
peared in  Europe  since  the  beginning  of  the 
Christian  era.  With  a  little  imagination  it  is 
not  difficult  to  note  the  resemblance  between 
similar  letters  of  the  old  Roman  capitals  and 
those  following  that  have  been  designated  as 
script,  italic,  Old  English  or  black  letter,  ver- 
sal,  uncial,  and  an  endless  list  of  alphabet  fami- 
lies. The  desire  for  speed,  and  the  influence  of 
the  tool,  pen,  reed,  chisel,  brush,  were  the  de- 
termining factors  in  the  change  of  form.  Cu- 
riously enough  instead  of  being  archaic,  the 
Roman  alphabet,  which  is  now  2,000  years  old, 
is  still  the  most  useful  because  of  its  legibility, 
and  also  the  most  beautiful. 

We  derived  twenty-three  of  our  letters  from 
the  Romans.  They  had  taken  probably  eight- 
een of  these  from  the  Greeks  about  the  fourth 
century  B.  C.  and  afterwards  borrowed  else- 
where or  invented  seven  more.  Instead  of  giv- 

[4] 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

ing  them  names  as  the  Greeks  did,  they  simply 
called  them  by  the  sounds  for  which  they  stood : 
A  (ah),  B  (bay).  They  introduced  the  curve 
wherever  possible,  whereas  the  early  Greek 
letters  were  all  angular — what  an  interesting 
analogy  is  evident  in  the  architecture  of  those 
two  peoples,  the  temple  pediment  and  angu- 
larity of  the  Greeks  as  contrasted  with  the 
dome  and  arch  of  the  Romans. 

The  Greeks,  in  their  contact  with  those 
great  traders  and  "Yankees  of  ancient  time," 
the  Phoenicians,  saw  the  value  of  their  alpha- 
betic writing  and  inaugurated  its  use  about 
the  time  of  the  first  Olympiad,  776  B.  C.  Three 
or  four  centuries  before  they  gave  it  to  the 
Romans  the  ancient  Greeks  found  use  for  fif- 
teen of  the  Phoenician  letters  and  then  con- 
ceived enough  to  round  out  an  alphabet  of 
twenty-four  characters.The  changes  that  took 
place  in  the  shape  of  their  letters  can  be  at- 
tributed to  their  sense  of  order;  the  letters  are 
balanced  better  and  the  parts  better  related. 

THE  Greeks  were  interested  in  the  sound 
value  only,  not  in  the  picture  value  of 
the  symbol,  and,  therefore,  they  probably  did 
not  notice  that  A,  for  instance,  had  ever  been 
a  picture  of  the  head  of  an  ox  and  that  it  was 
now  drawn  upside  down;  and  that  the  Phoe- 
nician name  "Alpeh"  meant  ox  and  that  they 
mispronounced  the  sound  in  calling  it  "Alpha. ' ' 
The  Romans  borrowed  from  the  Greeks 
and  the  Greeks  had  borrowed  from  the  Phoe- 
nicians, but  where  did  the  Phoenicians  obtain 
their  letters  ?  Did  they  invent  them  ?  To  what 
extent  were  these  letters  influenced  by  earlier 
systems  of  writings  as  those  employed  by  the 
Cretan,  Assyrian  and  Egyptian  civilizations? 
These  are  questions  that  probably  will  never 

[5] 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

be  answered  satisfactorily.  Many  arguments 
and  theories  are  advanced.  We  can,  however, 
trace  back  with  certainty  a  number  of  our 
letters  to  the  Phoenician  alphabet  of  1000  B. 
C.  Beyond  this  all  is,  at  present,  a  matter  of 
conjecture. 

The  Phoenician  alphabet  consisted  of  twen- 
ty-two pictures  of  familiar  objects.  These  pic- 
tures were  rudely  and  simply  made,  for  writers 
and  readers  soon  recognized  the  fundamental 
characteristics  andallunnecessary  details  were 
eliminated.  The  great  advance  that  can  be 
credited  to  them  is  that  they  realized  that  a 
small  number  of  sound-expressing  characters, 
if  well  selected,  are  sufficient  to  express  any 
word.  Other  races  at  this  period  had  phonetic 
systems  but  they  consisted  of  numerous  sym- 
bols and  cumbersome  appendages  of  non-al- 
phabetic characters- — "eye  pictures"  side  by 
side  with  "ear  pictures."  No  doubt  earlier 
Phoenician  writing  passed  through  the  stages 
of  development  traceable  in  so  many  countries : 

1.  The  pictures  or  characters  suggesting 
the  thing  or  incident  (picture  writing). 

2.  The  pictures  or  characters  symbolizing 
the  thing  or  idea  (ideographic  or  symbolic 
writing). 

3.  The  pictures  or  characters  representing 
the  sound  of  the  thing  or  idea  (phonograms). 

4.  The  sign  suggesting  the  various  sounds 
of  the  language  (alphabetic  system). 

To  free  this  last  stage  from  the  others  was 
the  great  Phoenician  contribution. 

A 

Why  is  A  the  first  letter?  It  represents  one 
of  the  commonest  vowel  sounds  in  ancient 
languages.  Naturally  the  Phoenician  alpha- 

[6] 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

bet  makers  selected  a  familiar  object  in  the 
name  of  which  this  particular  vowel  sound 
was  emphasized.  Since  food  is  of  primal  im- 
portance, it  is  not  surprising  to  find  that  he 
chose  the  ox — "Alef"  (ah'lef),  or  rather  the 
head  of  the  ox,  for  the  characteristics  of  ani- 
mals are  chiefly  embodied  in  the  head.  Not 
only  was  the  ox  important  as  food  but  also  as 
a  beast  of  burden,  for  the  ox  had  been  har- 
nessed to  the  plow  centuries  before  the  horse 
was  domesticated.  Thus  one  of  the  earliest 
and  most  important  of  man's  friends  among 
the  brute  creatures  was  honored. 

In  making  this  letterrepeatedly  and  rap- 
idly they  became  careless  and  instead  of  cross- 
ing the  letter  V  they  tried  to  make  it  with  one 
continuous  scratching,  hence  when  the  Greeks 
became  acquainted  with  it  three  to  five  cen- 
turies after  its  invention,  the  picture  had  de- 
teriorated almost  beyond  recognition.  They  in- 
troduced balance  and  the  V  was  inverted,  and 
the  cross-bar  was  retained  between  the  lines. 
Unknowingly  they  were  drawing  the  ox  head 
upside  down;  and  it  remains  so  with  us  to  this 
day.  The  Greeks  called  the  first  letter  alpha, 
the  Romans  called  it  A  (ah)  and  we  call  it  A 
(ay),  a  sound  it  never  possessed  in  Latin. 

B 

The  second  letter  of  the  alphabet  repre- 
sents a  crude  house,  roughly  outlined.  After 
food,  shelter  is  an  important  consideration 
and  this  fact  was  expressed  by  the  early  al- 
phabet maker.  The  Greeks  again  were  igno- 
rant of  the  picture  and  careless  or  indifferent 
as  to  the  exact  name  of  the  character,  and 
thus  two  triangles  instead  of  the  square  sup- 
porting a  triangle  were  made  and  the  name 


THE   STORY  OF  THE   ALPHABET 

changed  from  "beth"  to  "beta"  (ba'ta).  Com- 
bine the  Greek  names  for  the  first  two  letters 
and  we  have  (alpha-beta)  "alphabet."  The 
Romans  shortened  the  name  "beta,"  calling 
it  B  (bay)  and  introduced  the  curved  loops. 
The  original  name  is  familiar  to  us  through 
names  found  in  the  Scriptures:  Bethel  (house 
of  God)  and  Bethlehem  (house  of  bread). 

C-G 

The  "ship  of  the  desert,"  the  camel,  gave 
its  name  to  the  third  letter.  Our  name  for  this 
animal  is  traceable  back  to  the  Phoenician 
"gimel"  (ghe'mel)  or  "gamel"  (gah'mel).The 
long  neck  and  the  peculiar  angle  of  the  neck 
in  relation  to  the  head  could  easily  be  repre- 
sented. The  Greeks  made  changes  similar  to 
those  in  other  letters— they  improved  the  shape 
and  changed  the  name  to  "gamma."  The  Ro- 
mans did  not  forget  the  curve  and  gave  it  both 
the  hard  and  soft  sounds  (kay  and  gay).  Later 
on,  about  the  third  century  A.  D.,  to  distin- 
guish the  "g"  sound  from  the  "k"  sound  they 
added  a  little  bar  below  the  opening.  Thus  we 
get  both  C  and  G  from  the  picture  of  the  camel. 

Stevenson  said  that  when  he  was  a  child 
the  capital  G  always  impressed  him  as  a  genii 
swooping  down  to  drink  out  of  a  handsome 
cup.  Kipling's  story  of  the  invention  of  the  al- 
phabet is  filled  with  similar  delightful  stories 
of  the  picture  origin  of  letter  forms. 

D 

The  next  letter  D,  came  from  a  representa- 
tion of  a  door — "daleth"  (dahleth).  It  prob- 
ably pictures  the  door  of  a  tent.  A  custom 
that  prevails  among  the  Arabs  and  in  a  num- 

[8] 


THE    STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

her  of  countries  gave  particular  importance 
to  the  door  of  a  tent — a  stranger,  or  even  an 
enemy,  if  he  entered  through  the  door  of  a 
tent  must  receive  food,  drink  and  shelter. 
"Daleth"  became  "delta"  with  the  Greeks 
and  D  (day)  with  the  Romans,  who,  of  course, 
rounded  the  angle. 

E 

The  house  picture  gave  us  B,  the  door,  D, 
and  the  window,  E.  "He"  (hay)  meant  to 
look,  to  see,  or  window,  and  one  writer  as- 
serts our  familiar  street  cry  "hey,  there"  can 
be  traced  to  these  ancient  times.  One  side  bar 
of  the  window  was  lost  early. 

The  Greeks  at  first  used  this  sound  for  the 
long  "e"  (epsilon)  but  afterwards  employed 
the  character  H  or  "eta"  for  the  long  sound. 
The  Romans  at  first  made  no  change  except 
to  call  it  "eh." 

This  is  the  letter  that  occurs  so  frequently 
in  English  words,  and  many  no  doubt  recall 
the  interesting  use  that  Poe  makes  of  this  fact 
in  his  story  "The  Gold  Bug." 


Our  letter  order  does  not  agree  with  that 
of  the  Phoenicians  or  the  early  Greeks.  Our 
sixth  letter,  F,  is  missing  in  classical  Greek, 
but  it  is  found  in  earlier  writings.  It  comes 
from  a  Phoenician  representation  of  a  hook 
or  nail  (?)  "vau."  The  Hebrew  form  resem- 
bles the  latter  object.  The  nail  was  important 
in  shipbuilding,  a  common  industry  of  the 
early  traders.  When  the  Greeks  used  this  let- 
ter they  called  it  "digamma"  (double  gam- 
ma) and  its  form  represented  one  "gamma" 
(Greek  c)  superimposed  over  the  other.  The 

[9] 


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THE  STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

Romans  called  it  F  (ef)  and  during  the  reign 
of  Emperor  Claudius  the  consonant  V  was 
represented  by  the  F  inverted.  This  was  done 
because  the  Latin  alphabet  had  but  one  char- 
acter to  represent  U  and  V  and  OCTAVIA 
became  OCTAVIA. 

H 

Two  fence  posts  and  three  horizontal  boards 
gave  us  our  eighth  letter,  H.  The  fence  was 
called  "cheth"  (haith).  The  Greeks  omitted 
the  upper  and  lower  boards  thus  making  it 
like  our  H,  and  called  it  "eta"  (ata).  The  Ro- 
mans gave  it  a  soft  sound  H  (hah)  just  as  we 
do  today. 


The  parts  of  the  human  body  also  played 
an  important  part  in  giving  form  to  the  let- 
ters of  the  alphabet.  The  early  peoples  rec- 
ognized the  value  of  the  hand  and  the  head 
and  these  members  gave  rise  to  the  letters 
I  and  K,  and  Q  and  R  respectively.  The  hand 
in  profile  bent  at  the  knuckles  and  wrist 
gives  us  the  character  "yod"  (the  hand)  as 
used  by  the  Phoenicians.  The  Greeks,  who 
always  liked  to  have  their  words  end  in  vow- 
els, added  "a"  and  called  it  "Iota"  (e-o'ta). 
When  the  Romans  received  it,  it  was  simply 
a  vertical  stroke,  I  (ee)  which  represented 
the  same  long  "e"  sound  as  it  did  with  the 
Greeks,  but  later  they  used  it  both  as  a  con- 
sonant and  vowel,  differentiating  the  con- 
sonant by  making  the  letter  I  longer,  J;  but 
they  did  not  give  a  distinct  letter  form  for 
the  capital  J  until  the  sixteenth  century. 

The  small  j  came  into  being  nearly  a  cen- 
tury later.  The  dot  over  the  i  was  first  intro- 
duced in  a  thirteenth  century  manuscript. 

[12] 


THE    STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 

K 

The  silhouette  of  the  open  hand,  with  its 
radiating  lines,  discloses  the  origin  of  the  let- 
ter K,  "kaph,"  which  signified  hollow  or  palm. 
We  know  that  palmistry  was  practiced  by  the 
ancients,  and  probably  the  association  of  read- 
ing the  hand  and  writing  influenced  the  in- 
clusion of  this  character.  The  Greeks  added 
their  favorite  vowel  sound,  "a,"  again  and  thus 
obtained  their  "Kappa."  The  Romans  had  no 
need  for  this  letter  at  first,  as  C  furnished  the 
same  sound.  When  they  did  accept  it,  they 
made  no  change. 


The  ox  goad  or  whip  lash,  "lamed"  (lahr 
med)  gave  rise  to  the  next  letter.  Herding  oxen 
and  sheep  was  the  important  occupation  of  the 
slaves  of  the  Phoenicians  and  hence  the  last, 
an  object  so  unfamiliar  to  us,  was  easily  rec- 
ognized by  them.  The  Greeks  again  added  an 
"a"  and  called  it  "lambda"  and  made  it  in  the 
form  of  an  inverted  V.  The  Romans,  strangely, 
adhered  more  closely  to  the  original  form  than 
did  the  Greeks. 

M-N 

The  Phoenicians  were  lovers  of  the  sea, 
and  from  this  source  two  letters  were  derived, 
M  and  N.  They  explored  not  only  all  of  the 
Mediterranean  shore  at  an  early  date,  but 
they  also  sailed  boldly  through  the  gates  of 
Gibraltar,  and  "beyond  the  world"  where 
they  found  Britain.  They  were  the  first  navi- 
gators that  sailed  by  night  and  it  is  said  they 
discovered  the  north  star.  Therefore  it  is  not 
surprising  that  water  "mem"  (maim)  is  the 


THE   STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 

source  of  M  and  that  fish,  "nun"  (noon)  the 
source  of  N.  The  letter  M  has  changed  but 
little  in  form,  it  is  the  Greek  letter  "Mu"  and 
the  Roman  M  (em).  The  head  of  the  fish, 
from  which  the  letter  N  is  pictured,  was  sim- 
plified even  more  than  the  head  of  the  ox,  in 
A.  It  no  doubt  represents  the  fisherman's 
viewpoint — not  a  swimming  fish  but  a  sus- 
pended one.  The  Greeks  reversed  the  stroke 
and  called  it  "Nu"  and  the  Romans  did  not 
change  its  form  but  called  it  N  (en). 

O 

In  Phoenicia,  as  in  Egypt,  China  and  Mex- 
ico, the  eye  is  one  of  the  commonest  elements 
found  in  the  writing.  It  was  called  "Ayin" 
(ah-yin).  The  Greeks  used  it  for  two  sounds 
now  designated  by  "omicron,"  little  "o,"  and 
"omega,"great"o,"the  letter  which,strangely, 
was  placed  at  the  end  of  the  Greek  alphabet. 
We  find  in  the  Bible:  "I  am  the  Alpha  and  the 
Omega,  the  beginning  and  the  end,  the  first 
and  the  last."  How  many  today  would  think 
of  using  the  alphabet  for  such  an  important 
illustration?  It  is  easy  to  trace  the  Roman  O 
(oh)  from  its  Greek  parent,  "omicron." 


Many  letter  pictures  run  in  pairs — finger 
and  hand,  water  and  fish — and  now  after  eye 
we  find  mouth  "pi"  (pe)  which  represents  the 
lower  lip.  The  Greeks  made  little  change  in 
the  name  or  shape  at  first,  but  later  they  in- 
troduced the  angles  and  made  the  downward 
strokes  equal.  The  Romans  formed  the  letter 
by  continuing  the  curve  farther  than  the 
Phoenicians  and  called  it  "pe"  (pay). 


THE    STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 


Now  we  come  to  Q  and  R,  the  letters  which 
were  mentioned  above  as  those  probably  com- 
ing from  the  head.  Whether  Q  (koph)  was  de- 
rived from  the  picture  of  the  back  view  of  the 
head  and  neck,  or  whether  it  represents  a 
knot,  which,  no  doubt,  was  as  important  to 
navigators  then  as  it  is  now,  is  a  mooted 
question.  The  Q  sound  is  guttural  and  the 
tail  of  the  letter  is  supposed  to  indicate  the 
throat  sound.  The  Greeks  soon  discarded 
"koppa,"  as  it  was  called,  and  the  Romans 
went  back  to  the  original  source  for  their  Q 
(koo). 

The  back  view  of  the  head  is  the  unusual 
one,  for  as  we  look  at  the  drawing  of  the  early 
races,  or  memory  pictures,  or  the  delineations 
of  a  child  of  seven  or  eight  we  find  they  are 
almost  without  exception  profile  pictures. 
The  Phoenician  "resh"  represents  the  profile 
and  shows  very  little  resemblance  to  a  hu- 
man being,  although  at  first  the  features  may 
have  been  more  clearly  indicated.  The  Greeks, 
as  was  to  be  expected,  turned  the  letter  around, 
and  later,  oddly  enough,  introduced  a  curve 
making  it  exactly  like  the  Roman  letter  P. 
The  extra  stroke  which  we  find  in  the  Roman 
letter  was  no  doubt  due  to  the  carelessness  in 
copying.  They  pronounced  it  R  (air). 


There  is  a  common  legend  explaining  S,  the 
letter  with  the  hissing  sound.  Because  of  its 
curved  shape  and  its  hissing  sound  many  peo- 
ple believe  it  to  be  derived  from  a  snake.  Its 
real  history  is  easily  followed  from  Phoeni- 
cian "shin"  or  "sin"  (teeth)  to  the  present  day. 


=» 

THE    STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 

Its  form  closely  resembled  our  W.  The  Greeks 
madeitperpendicular  for  their "sigma"and  the 
Romans  simplified  and  curved  it  giving  S  (ess) . 


Our  twentieth  letter,  T,  is  particularly  in- 
teresting because  it  is  derived  from  "tahv" 
a  mark  or  cross  made  by  people  who  could 
not  write,  and  no  doubt  their  signature  fre- 
quently resembled  it.  We  must  not  forget  that 
even  Charlemagne  and  other  kings  of  the  mid- 
dle ages  had  to  make  their  mark  or  trace  their 
initials  through  stencil  plates.  The  only  change' 
of  "tahv"  to  Greek  "tau,"  and  to  Roman  T 
(tay)  was  the  raising  of  the  cross  bar. 

U-V-Y 

The  letters  U,  V  and  Y  were  all  taken  from 
the  letter  "Upsilon,"  and  it  may  have  been 
derived  from  the  queer  Hebrew  form  of 
"Ayin"  which  closely  resembles  Y.  The  let- 
ters U  and  V  were  interchangeable.  Upsilon, 
known  as  the  "Samian  letter,"  was  used  by 
Pythagoras  as  an  emblem  to  represent  the 
parting  of  the  ways — the  young  man  making 
a  choice  in  life. 

W 

Our  Anglo-Saxon  forefathers  contributed 
two  letters,  W  (wen)  and  another  often  con- 
fused with  Y,  called  "thorn."  These  were  in- 
troduced during  the  thirteenth  century.  The 
French  always  called  the  former  letter  double 
vay,  and  in  English  it  may  be  said  to  repre- 
sent double  U,  as  its  name  indicates.  The  let- 
ter "thorn"  had  the  value  of  the  digraph 
"th,"  and  "ye"  in  old  English  should  be  pro- 
nounced "the"  like  the  definite  article. 

[16] 


THE   STORY  OF  THE  ALPHABET 

x-z 

,  Although  we  have  no  direct  need  for  the 
letter  X,  for  Z  can  be  substituted  for  it  when 
it  is  used  as  an  initial  letter,  and  "ks"  when 
used  elsewhere,  it  has  remained  in  the  alpha- 
bet since  its  frequent  use  by  the  Greeks.  It 
came  from  the  Roman  X  (eex)  which  may 
have  been  derived  from  the  Greek  "ksi."  The 
latter  resembles  the  Phoenician  character 
"samech,"  meaning  a  post  or  support. 

The  dagger  "zayin"  from  which  we  obtain 
our  Z  must  have  been  important  in  the  daily 
lives  of  the  Greeks,  Hebrews  and  Phoenicians 
for  it  occupies  the  sixth  place  (Zeta)  and  the 
seventh  in  the  latter  alphabets.  The  Romans 
did  not  change  its  name  or  shape,  but  al- 
though there  has  been  little  change  in  2,000 
years  we  see  little  resemblance  to  the  short 
sword  in  the  letter  the  Romans  gave  to  us. 

MANY  slight  changes  that  have  occurred 
in  the  formation  of  the  letters  of  the 
alphabet  may  be  accounted  for.  At  first  the 
Greeks  wrote  from  left  to  right  in  one  line 
and  from  right  to  left  on  the  next  line — a 
mode  of  writing  which  has  been  termed  "bous- 
trophedon"  because  it  runs  as  an  ox  plow  does 
in  a  field,  up  one  furrow  and  down  another. 
It  is  due  to  this  fact  that  many  letters  were 
reversed  from  their  original  prototypes.  It  is 
interesting  to  note  that  recently  books  for  the 
blind  have  been  embossed  in  this  manner. 

The  small  letters  of  the  alphabet,  sometimes 
called  "lower  case"  letters  because  printers 
keep  them  in  a  case  below  the  capitals,  or  "mi- 
nuscule letters"  in  contrast  with  "majuscule," 
or  capital  letters,  illustrate  further  changes 


THE    STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 

due  to  rapid  writing  of  capitals  in  a  cursive  or 
running  hand. 

The  few  characters  selected  by  the  Phoe- 
nicians, the  great  traders,  artificers  and  farm- 
ers of  the  ancient  world,  not  only  influenced 
Greek  literature  and  life,  Roman  and  modern 
nations  in  Europe,  but  also  spread  eastward 
to  the  very  walls  of  China.  The  Hebrews  copied 
them  as  a  whole  and  retained  the  original  names 
with  only  slight  variations.  They  did  change 
the  shapes  because  a  different  writing  instru- 
ment was  employed. 

According  to  a  legend,  Jehovah  gave  the  let- 
ters to  Moses,  hence  all  the  left  curves  in  He- 
brew letter  form  turn  upward — as  symbols  of 
a  finger  pointing  heavenward. 

The  Phoenician  alphabet  is  also  the  parent 
of  the  Arabic,  Indian,  Javanese,  Corean,  Ti- 
betan, Coptic  syllabaries  and  alphabets.  No 
small  country  ever  gave  such  a  great  gift  to 
humanity;  no  large  country  could  have  given 
a  greater  gift. 


[18] 


THE    STORY  OF   THE  ALPHABET 

THE  ABCsOFTHE 

MUNDER 
PRINTING  PLANT 

is  the  first  letter  of  the 
word  "ART."  Art  in  print- 
ing means  the  style,  the 
elegance,  its  suitability  to 
the  purpose  for  which  it  is 
intended.  Art  is  the"how" 
of  printed  matter.  Each 
piece  of  printing  should  be  dressed  in  that  par- 
ticular style  which  will  make  it  most  effective 
in  accomplishing  its  purpose.  That  is  real  An. 

Bis  the  first  letter  of  the  word  "BUSINESS." 
There  is  a  saying  that  "business  is  busi- 
ness," which  means  that  it  should  be  given  the 
very  best  possible  attention  and  that  all  prom- 
ises should  be  fulfilled.  It  is  a  very  common  ex- 
perience to  be  looking  for  something  and  to  be 
really  disappointed  because  it  fails  to  come  when 
expected.  Business  would  be  more  successful 
if  all  lived  up  to  requirements  in  this  particular; 
the  fulfillment  of  a  promise  is  an  obligation. 

Cis  the  first  letter  of  a  great  word,  "CouR- 
TESY."  Who  cares  to  deal  with  a  firm  that 
is  discourteous?  How  pleasant  business  can  be 
made  if  all  participating  in  it  are  pleasant  and 
courteous!  Really,  people  will  not  deal  with 
those  who  are  discourteous.  On  the  other  hand 
they  turn  to  those  who  are  courteous  and  kind. 
Do  you  know  your  A  B  C's  in  business? 
And  in  your  private  affairs  as  well? 

NORM  ANT.  A.  MUNDER  &  Co. 


[19] 


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